ABSTRACT Organic farming aims to create an integrated, humane, environmentally and economically sustainable agricultural system. For organic dairy systems, the fulfilment of these aims requires the understanding and integration of a number of systems components including land use (mixed or dairy only) and stocking rate; grassland and forage production, including quantity and quality; potential milk yield and milk quality; animal nutrition (largely farm based) and health; environmental sustainability such as farm nutrient balance; the financial status of the farm, including enterprise performance, fixed costs and labour use, and farm income and profit; and finally the policy environment in which organic dairy systems operate. This review discusses worldwide research undertaken into each of these key components of organic dairy production systems. As converting organic dairy systems are often considerably different to established organic systems, both the converting and developed organic dairy system are discussed in this paper.


The value of qualitative evidence synthesis for informing healthcare policy and practice within evidence-based medicine is increasingly recognised. However, there is a lack of consensus regarding how to judge the methodological quality of qualitative studies being synthesised and debates around the extent to which such assessment is possible and appropriate. The Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) tool is the most commonly used tool for quality appraisal in health-related qualitative evidence syntheses, with endorsement from the Cochrane Qualitative and Implementation Methods Group. The tool is recommended for novice qualitative researchers, but there is little existing guidance on its application. This article considers issues related to the suitability and usability of the CASP tool for quality appraisal in qualitative evidence synthesis in order to support and improve future appraisal exercises framed by the tool. We reflect on our practical experience of using the tool in a systematic review and qualitative evidence synthesis. We discuss why it is worth considering a study's underlying theoretical, ontological and epistemological framework and how this could be incorporated into the tool by way of a novel question. We consider how particular features of the tool may impact its interpretation, the appraisal results and the subsequent synthesis. We discuss how to use quality appraisal results to inform the next stages of evidence synthesis and present a novel approach to organising the synthesis, whereby studies deemed to be of higher quality contribute relatively more to the synthesis. We propose tool modifications, user guidance, and areas for future methodological research.


Background & objectives: Screening and early diagnosis of delayed development in children particularly among high risk groups are obligatory. Children with a history of one or more risk factors in pre-natal, peri-natal and post-natal periods are prone to delayed development in comparison with normal population. This study was launched to assess the developmental status in children with a history of NICU admission. Methods: In this study 114 children, aged between 4-60 months with a history of NICU admission were recruited. ASQ questionnaires including information in 5 fields: communication, fine and gross motor status, personal-social and problems solving, were filled for each one of the cases by their parents. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and Chi square test. Results: Among 114 cases, there were 71.1% male. Totally 70.2% of cases were premature. The most prevalent reason for admission was immaturity. The average weight of infants was 2233±680 gram. Figures of abnormal findings in 5 fields were: communication 20.2%, gross motor 17.5%, fine motor 19.3%, problem solving 8.8% and personal-social 16.7%. In this study 67.5% of children showed normal development while 6.1% were abnormal in all 5 fields and 26.3% were abnormal in at least one filed. Statistically, there weren't significant differences between various developmental fields and genus, length of hospital stay and birth weight. Conclusion: Despite normal developmental status in majority of children with a history of NICU admission, a considerable number of them had delayed development in at least one field. These findings suggest a need for patient screening and intense follow up programs.


While a scientific journal article is an original literary work for the purposes of copyright law, many contributors listed as 'authors' on such articles are not authors for the purposes of copyright; and some contributors who are copyright authors might not be listed as such in the byline. Although 'authorship' might have different meanings to copyright lawyers and to scientists, this concept is challenged in interesting ways by the activities of large collaborations in both contexts (copyright law and science). This article considers whether science's responses to the challenge of attributing authorship in respect of highly collaborative work might offer any insights for copyright. In particular, the attempts of biomedical science journals to limit authorship claims to dominant contributors are contrasted with the highly inclusive approach taken by particle physics collaborations. It is then argued that although it is important to retain a core legal notion of authorship, this notion ought to be applied in a way that is sensitive to the context in which creativity occurs. The article concludes with some suggestions on how the joint authorship test might be recalibrated in the light of the different ways that large groups create.


The conventional resonant-approaches to scavenge kinetic energy are typically confined to narrow and single-band frequencies. The vibration energy harvester device reported here combines both direct resonance and parametric resonance in order to enhance the power responsiveness towards more efficient harnessing of real-world ambient vibration. A packaged electromagnetic harvester designed to operate in both of these resonant regimes was tested in situ on the Forth Road Bridge. In the field-site, the harvester, with an operational volume of ∼126 cm3, was capable of recovering in excess of 1 mW average raw AC power from the traffic-induced vibrations in the lateral bracing structures underneath the bridge deck. The harvester was integrated off-board with a power conditioning circuit and a wireless mote. Duty- cycled wireless transmissions from the vibration-powered mote was successfully sustained by the recovered ambient energy. This limited duration field test provides the initial validation for realising vibration-powered wireless structural health monitoring systems in real world infrastructure, where the vibration profile is both broadband and intermittent.


The selection of the cutter type is of crucial importance to maximise the advantages of mechanical rock excavation systems. Specific energy (SE), cutter forces, and rock properties are used to decide what type of cutter is most suitable for economical excavation of the rock based on laboratory rock cutting tests. This study is concerned with the preliminary results of an ongoing rock cutting program in which a mini-disc has been compared with a point-attack pick in laboratory linear cutting tests simulating a cutterhead on a Helidon sandstone block. Analysis of the preliminary results has shown that the mini-disc experienced lower mean cutting forces and was seven times more efficient than the pick in first layer cuts. However, the mini-disc had mean normal forces 1.5 times higher than the pick. Additionally, first layer cuts taken on the trimmed surfaces required more forces and SE than completely relieved cuts in pick cutting.


Objectives Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a connective tissue disease associated with signifi cant morbidity and mortality and generally inadequate treatment. Endothelial cell activation and apoptosis are thought to be pivotal in the pathogenesis of this disease, but the mechanisms that mediate this remain unknown. Methods Human dermal microvascular endothelial cells were cultured with healthy control neutrophils in the presence of 25% healthy control or SSc serum for 24 h. Apoptosis was measured by annexin V-FITC binding and endothelial cell activation was measured using an allophycocyanin-conjugated E-selectin antibody. Fluorescence was quantifi ed and localised using confocal microscopy. Results SSc serum resulted in signifi cantly increased apoptosis (p=0.006) and E-selectin expression (p=0.00004) in endothelial cells compared with control serum, effects that were critically dependent on the presence of neutrophils. Recombinant interleukin 6 (IL-6) reproduced these fi ndings. Immunodepletion of IL-6 and the use of an IL-6 neutralising antibody decreased the effect of SSc serum on E-selectin expression. Soluble gp130, which specifi cally blocks IL-6 trans-signalling, negated the effect of SSc serum on both E-selectin expression and apoptosis. Conclusions SSc serum induces endothelial cell activation and apoptosis in endothelial cell-neutrophil co-cultures, mediated largely by IL-6 and dependent on the presence of neutrophils. Together with other pathologically relevant effects of IL-6, these data justify further exploration of IL-6 as a therapeutic target in SSc.


This paper presents a vignette of our development of a robot-based app sponsored by the corporation producing the robot. The discussion in this paper begins with the affordances of humanoid robots that enable transformative pedagogical approaches to address children's needs. Next, we present our design case, where we develop a humanoid robot-based English-learning curriculum for young children to learn English as a second language. This case highlights a multifaceted app development process that involves synergistic, multidisciplinary teamwork and design enhancement through repeated observations of child/robot interactions. We present a few snapshots from the design case to illustrate the teamwork and design enhancement. From our observations in repeated user testing, the robot app seems to induce independent navigation, sustained attention and engagement, and rich learning experiences for children. The design challenges and the way we address them may be useful for others developing similar interventions for young children.


Students from various engineering disciplines who enroll in an Introductory Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) class often harbor a variety of robust misconceptions. The goal of this study is to investigate the origins of these misconceptions and identify barriers to student learning of introductory MSE concepts. To categorize the sources of student misconceptions, Taber's typology of learning impediments was used. A synthesis of research literature concerning K-12 and undergraduate physical science and chemistry misconceptions was also conducted to reveal origins of MSE related misconceptions. Misconceptions that are present in undergraduate introductory MSE students were revealed using the Materials Concept Inventory (MCI). The misconceptions were linked to four distinct categories of K-12 misconceptions in physical science and chemistry: 1) the nature of crystalline structure and unit cells, 2) the relationship between material characteristics and bonding, 3) material processing, and 4) saturation and super-saturation. These misconceptions were caused by deficiency, fragmentation, ontological, and pedagogical learning impediments. From the comparison and categorization of these misconceptions' origins, we have made suggestions for developing effective misconception interventions and teaching approaches for introductory MSE classes.


Low solubility of proteins overexpressed in E. coli is a frequent problem in high-throughput structural genomics. To improve solubility of proteins from mesophilic Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 and thermophilic Clostridium thermocellum JW20, an approach was attempted that included a fusion of the target protein to a maltose-binding protein (MBP) and a decrease of induction temperature. The MBP was selected as the most efficient solubilizing carrier when compared to a glutathione S-transferase and a Nus A protein. A tobacco etch virus (TEV) protease recognition site was introduced between fused proteins using a double polymerase-chain reaction and four primers. In this way, 79 S. oneidensis proteins have been expressed in one case with an N-terminal 30-residue tag and in another case as a fusion protein with MBP. A foreign tag might significantly affect the properties of the target polypeptide. At 37 degrees C and 18 degrees C induction temperatures, only 5 and 17 tagged proteins were soluble, respectively. In fusion with MBP 4, 34, and 38 proteins were soluble upon induction at 37 degrees, 28 degrees, and 18 degrees C, respectively. The MBP is assumed to increase stability and solubility of a target protein by changing both the mechanism and the cooperativity of folding/unfolding. The 66 C. thermocellum proteins were expressed as fusion proteins with MBP. Induction at 37 degrees, 28 degrees, and 18 degrees C produced 34, 57, and 60 soluble proteins, respectively. The higher solubility of C. thermocellum proteins in comparison with the S. oneidensis proteins under similar conditions of induction correlates with the thermophilicity of the host. The two-factor Wilkinson-Harrison statistical model was used to identify soluble and insoluble proteins. Theoretical and experimental data showed good agreement for S. oneidensis proteins; however, the model failed to identify soluble/insoluble Clostridium proteins. A suggestion has been made that the Wilkinson-Harrison model is not applicable to C. thermocellum proteins because it did not account for the peculiarities of protein sequences from thermophiles.


Radioimmunoassays for detecting cell-associated or released virus are described using either 125I- or [3H]acetate-labeled antibodies. In the first assay system, antigen-antibody complexes were separated from free antibody by centrifugation. Sensitivities of 0.1 μg of iridescent virus could be achieved with either 125I- or [3H]acetate-labeled antibody. In the second assay, the antigen was fixed to cover-slip cell cultures, and then reacted with labeled antibody, unbound radioactivity being removed by repeated washing. Nonspecific binding with this method was 0.5 to 1% of the total radioactivity added and sensitivities of 0.1 or 10 μg were achieved with 125I and [3H]acetate, respectively. Immunoglobulins were labeled at the rate of 1 in 300 for 125I and 1 in 200 with [3H]acetate although there was a 400-fold greater isotopic abundance of 125I relative to 3H. The possibility of preparing labeled protein of high specific activity using carrier-free [2-3H]iodoacetic acid is discussed.


PT. Sari Warna Asli is one of big developing companies. Here, the data
and the estimation posts come to a very high number. With the manual data
processing, there are two disadvantages, i.e. the high possibility of error and the
long time needed.
The computer technology has advantages concerning speed and the
coverage of the processing, mechanical accuracy, storing, access data, and
ability to process the high volume data. Therefore, the developing of information
system in PT. Sari Warna Asli uses the computer technology. The application
program are created in line with the procedure of data processing previously
done manually. The aims are to evaluate and verify the data. The information
system supported by the computer technology is a management solution to solve
the problem arising in the organizational environment.
The new system is created with the purpose to create an efficient system
and to remove the unnecessary procedure or the one experiencing duplication.
The determination that the new system must be better than the old one is
measured by the factors of speed in producing the data, accuracy, and
comprehensive capability of integrating all the elements of data processing. In
this way, the more relevant and cheaper information can be attained.
The way of implementation is an evolution to realization of information's
resources which have a strategic function. The success of the Computer Basic
Information System's development is sure by the behavior side. How to make
partnership in all of the factory staff. The manager's and the peoples in the " key
position" are they who really understand about their factory and their working
are very needed.


Not rooted in a traditional culture or ancestral homeland, Queerness constitutes ephemeral cultures, continually reinvented and reimagined. Queerness is under constant threat of erasure from cultural amnesia and political malice. Academia and the art world have responded to this erasure with alternately heroic and halting efforts.
 This paper suggests ways in which this erasure manifests, from historic forces to contemporary discourses. The author attempts to assess various responses to queer erasure in the overlapping enclaves of new media art comprised of artists, academics, writers, and curators. Lastly, this paper will consider how new media art inflects or reframes ongoing conversations around queer social erasure and how artists and art historians work against the forces of nothingness.


This article presents flexible new models for the dependence structure, or copula, of economic variables based on a latent factor structure. The proposed models are particularly attractive for relatively high-dimensional applications, involving 50 or more variables, and can be combined with semiparametric marginal distributions to obtain flexible multivariate distributions. Factor copulas generally lack a closed-form density, but we obtain analytical results for the implied tail dependence using extreme value theory, and we verify that simulation-based estimation using rank statistics is reliable even in high dimensions. We consider "scree" plots to aid the choice of the number of factors in the model. The model is applied to daily returns on all 100 constituents of the S&P 100 index, and we find significant evidence of tail dependence, heterogeneous dependence, and asymmetric dependence, with dependence being stronger in crashes than in booms. We also show that factor copula models provide superior estimates of some measures of systemic risk. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.


Chemical speciation of L-glutamic acid complexes of Ca(II), Mg(II) and Zn(II) in the presence of (0-60% v/v) Dimethylsulfoxide-water mixtures has been studied pH-metrically at 303.0K and at an ionic strength of 0.16 mol L-1. The active forms of ligand are of LH3 +, LH2, LH- and L2-. The models containing different number of species were refined by using the computer program MINIQUAD75. The number of species in the models is chosen based on exhaustive modeling. The predominant species detected are ML2H4 2+, ML2H3 +, ML2H2, ML2H- and ML2 2-. The best fit chemical models were arrived at based on statistical parameters. The appropriateness of the models is ascertained by studying the effect of errors in concentrations of ingredients. The trend in variation of stability constants with change in the composition of medium is explained on the basis of electrostatic and non-electrostatic forces. Chemical speciation was discussed based on the distribution diagrams.


The acoustic approximation for anisotropic media is widely used in current industry imaging and inversion algorithms mainly because P-waves constitute the majority of the energy recorded in seismic exploration. The resulting acoustic formulas tend to be simpler, resulting in more efficient implementations, and depend on fewer medium parameters. However, conventional solutions of the acoustic wave equation with higher-order derivatives suffer from shear wave artifacts. Thus, we derive a new acoustic wave equation for wave propagation in transversely isotropic (TI) media, which is based on a partially separable approximation of the dispersion relation for TI media and free of shear wave artifacts. Even though our resulting equation is not a partial differential equation, it is still a linear equation. Thus, we propose to implement this equation efficiently by combining the finite difference approximation with spectral evaluation of the space-independent parts. The resulting algorithm provides solutions without the constrain of ≥ δ. Numerical tests demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach.


Security assessment and classification are the major concerns in real-time operation of electric power systems. This paper proposes a multiclass support vector machine (SVM) classifier for static and transient security assessment and classification. A straightforward and quick procedure called the sequential forward selection method is used for a feature selection process. The security status of any given operating condition is classified into four modes, viz., secure, critically secure, insecure, and highly insecure, based on the computation of a security index. The proposed SVM-based pattern classifier system is implemented and tested on standard benchmark systems. The simulation results of the multiclass SVM classifier are compared with least-squares, probabilistic neural network, extreme learning machine, and extreme SVM classifiers. The feasibility of implementation of the proposed classifier system for online security evaluation is also discussed.


In 2009 New Mexico prospectively repealed the death penalty. Three years later in 2012, New Mexico prosecuted a defendant for a capital murder that was committed before repeal, and it sought to subject him to the death penalty. If state prosecutors had prevailed with the jury, they would have secured the very kind of sentence – death – that state officials had been lauded in Europe for outlawing three years earlier. A prosecution like New Mexico's could never occur in Europe, and not merely because Europe has long outlawed the death penalty. It could never occur because, in contrast to the law of most American jurisdictions, European states embrace a doctrine known as "lex mitior" ("the milder law"). The latter doctrine is a counterpart to the ex post facto prohibition. Both doctrines both concern retroactivity in criminal law, but they are the converse of one another. The ex post facto doctrine prohibits retroactivity by prohibiting the state from prosecuting persons under criminal statutes that either retroactively criminalize conduct that was hitherto lawful or retroactively increase penalties for conduct that, while unlawful all along, was hitherto punishable less severely. In contrast, lex mitior mandates retroactivity by mandating that criminal defendants receive the retroactive benefits of repealing statutes that either decriminalize conduct altogether or reduce punishments for it. After surveying laws in the United States regarding the retroactive effect of ameliorative repeals, the author addresses whether punishing offenders under harsher laws that obtained at the time of their conduct can serve consequentialist and/or retributive purposes of punishment. He concludes that, although doing can be morally justified under limited circumstances, typically it is not – a conclusion that bears upon lex mitior's proper scope, whether it consists of a binding norm (as it is among European nations), a nonconstitutional norm (as it presently is within the United States), or, when legislative intent is uncertain, a function of the rule of lenity.


We have analyzed the frequency and distribution of cells expressing estrogen receptor (ER) in cryosections of normal human breast tissue using quantitative microspectrophotometry and the estrogen receptor immunocytochemical assay. We found that the human mammary gland contained a small but distinct population of ER-positive cells, comprising approximately 7% of the total epithelial cell population from all biopsies. Stromal cells were found to be ER negative. The ER-positive cells were distributed as scattered single cells, with the highest frequency and intensity of measured staining in the lobules as compared to the interlob ular ducts. Moreover, on the average, 87% of the ER-positive cells were luminal epithelial cells or occupied an intermediate position in the duct wall. The intermediate cells were found not to express basal cell phenotype as determined by combined immunocytochemistry to ER and "com mon acute lymphoblastic leukemia antigen*1selectively decorating myoepithelial cells (B. A. Gusterson et al., J. Nati. Cancer Inst., 77: 343349, 1986).


Mildew and rust are the most devastating cereal pathogens, and in wheat they can cause up to 50% yield loss every year. Wheat lines containing resistance genes are used to effectively control fungal diseases, but the molecular mechanisms underlying the interaction between wheat and its fungal pathogens are poorly understood. Here, we used RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) to compare the transcriptomic landscape of susceptible and resistant wheat lines to identify genes and pathways that are targeted by obligate biotrophic fungal pathogens. The five lines differed in the expression of thousands of genes under infection as well as control conditions. Generally, mixed infection with powdery mildew and leaf rust resulted in downregulation of numerous genes in susceptible lines. Interestingly, transcriptomic comparison between the nearly isogenic lines Thatcher and Thatcher-Lr34 identified 753 genes that are uniquely downregulated in the susceptible line upon infection. Kyoto encyclopedia of genes and genomes (KEGG) enrichment analysis, revealed the suppression of six major biochemical pathways, namely nuclear transport, alternative splicing, DNA damage response, ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis, phosphoinositol signaling, and photosynthesis. We conclude that powdery mildew and leaf rust evade the wheat defense system by suppression of programmed cell death (PCD) and responses to cellular damage. Considering the broad range of the induced changes, we propose that the pathogen targets "master regulators" at critical steps in the respective pathways. Identification of these wheat genes targeted by the pathogen could inspire new directions for future wheat breeding.


Barium titanate (BaTiO3) ceramics with various grain sizes from 0.7 to 13 μm on average were prepared by a conventional sintering method, a two-step sintering method and a rate controlled two-step sintering method. The permittivity of the ceramics was increased with decreasing grain size to 1.1 μm on average. However, the permittivity of the ceramics was decreased when the grain size was below 1 μm. The field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM) observations revealed that the 90º domain width decreased with decreasing the grain size. By ultrawide range dielectric spectra from kHz to THz range of the BaTiO3 ceramics, the domain contribution to the permittivity was investigated. For the BaTiO3 ceramics with grain sizes over 1 μm, the dipole polarizability and the ionic polarizability were enhanced by high domain-wall density. In contrast, for the BaTiO3 ceramics with grain sizes below 1 μm, these polarizabilities were weakened.


This study focused on the difference in number and quality of diagnostic statements generated by nurses using a medical or nursing database and the supportive evidence for the diagnoses. The results revealed no statistical difference in the number or quality of nursing diagnoses generated from the databases; 12 (44%) of the 34 diagnoses were not supported by assessment data. Nurses had difficulty writing etiologies that were supported by assessment data and for which nurses can intervene independently. The findings support the conclusion that nursing diagnosis is a weak component of the nursing process.


Exon 7 of the phenylalanine hydroxylase (PAH) gene was analyzed in 45 children affected with classic phenylketonuria (PKU) from northern China by using PCR-single strand conformation polymorphism (PCR-SSCP) technique and DNA direct sequencing. Six missense mutations(i.e. R243Q, R241H, G247V, L249H, F2541 and G257V) and one silent mutation (V245v) were identified. The latter three missense mutations were demonstrated as novel mutations in comparison with the PAH mutation database. One missense mutation (R241H) was first documented in Chinese. Our results showed population and region differences in the PAH mutation distribution, and suggest that there is more than one founding population for PKU in China. The finding of novel mutations will enhence the molecular diagnosis of PKU.


Distinguishing between reactive mesothelial proliferations and adenocarcinoma is often very difficult. Ancillary studies, in particular immunohistochemistry, are often critical in detecting malignant epithelial cells, especially in serous effusion specimens. MOC-31 and Ber-EP4 are antibodies which target the epithelial cell adhesion molecule (Ep-CAM, TACSTD1) expressed in epithelial cells, and both are useful in distinguishing metastatic adenocarcinoma from reactive mesothelial cells. However, the reactivity of MOC-31 and Ber-EP4 with breast carcinoma, one of the more common carcinomas involving serous effusions, has not been extensively studied. We analyzed the immunohistochemical expression of MOC-31 and Ber-EP4 using tissue microarrays containing invasive ductal carcinoma (191 cases), invasive lobular carcinoma (44 cases), and 102 other carcinoma types comprising primary carcinomas of lung, gynecologic tract, pancreas, colon, gastric, esophageal, prostate, head and neck, hepatic, and renal origin. For MOC-31, 184 of 191 (96%) invasive ductal carcinomas and 39 of 44 (89%) invasive lobular carcinomas exhibited diffuse positive staining. In contrast, for Ber-EP4, 121 of 183 (66%) invasive ductal carcinomas and 11 of 40 (27.5%) invasive lobular carcinomas exhibited diffuse positive staining. With the exception of 1 case of esophageal adenocarcinoma, all other adenocarcinomas (86 of 87 cases) exhibited diffuse staining with both Ber-EP4 and MOC-31. MOC-31 and Ber-EP4 exhibited identical staining with all other carcinoma types. Our findings indicate that MOC-31 is superior to Ber-EP4 in detecting both invasive lobular and ductal carcinoma of the breast.


Scale 1:25,000. Polyconic Projection with 1000 YD. Hawaiian Grid. Semi-Controlled Mosaic for the Engineer Tenth Army. Compiled by the 64th Engr. Top Bn,, USAFCPBC from Mosaics by Wheeler Field Photo Lab. Dec. 1944. Photography from Army Sorties November, December 1944. 64th Engr. Top. Bn., USAFCPBC No. 8063-9.


ASEAN and Malaysia, have successfully wielded each other's existence to accomplish success in various aspects. Malaysia has played a crucial role in facilitating and molding the overall development and progress of ASEAN and played a vital part in establishing the foundation of the ASEAN Charter which presents the lawful character of ASEAN. On the other hand, Malaysia is a trading country that strongly relies on its associates at the international stage and ASEAN comes on the way of uplifting the process. Malaysia has received various advantages of trade incentives, international relations, and facilities like investment coordination, trade liberalization, etc. This paper intends to manifest the influence of ASEAN in Malaysia. It also highlights profuse aspects of the role of Malaysia on ASEAN, how they build each other's strength. The purpose of this paper is to bring the issue to light about how ASEAN can overcome the shortcomings and depend on its intrinsic unity only, and create a stronger relationship with Malaysia by overcoming the deficiencies.


ABSTRACT
Neutral electrolyzed water (NEW) is an oxidizing sanitizer that can be made locally on-site; it is often stored in a ready-to-use format to accumulate the large volumes required for periodic or seasonal use. The shelf stability of NEW sanitizer was, therefore, assessed under various storage conditions to guide the development of protocols for its industrial application. To that end, fresh NEW with an available chlorine concentration (ACC) of 480 mg/L, pH 6.96, and oxidation reduction potential (ORP) of 916 mV was stored under different conditions. These were open or sealed polypropylene bottles, three different surface area-to-volume (SA:V) ratios (0.9, 1.7, and 8.7), and two temperatures (4 and 25°C). NEW stored at 4°C was significantly more stable than NEW stored at 25°C; ACC and pH decreased by 137 mg/L and 0.7, respectively, whereas ORP increased by 23 mV, after 101 days of storage. At 25°C, ACC decreased to <0.01 mg/L after 52 days in bottles with a SA:V ratio of 8.7, with a similar decrease after 101 days in bottles with a SA:V ratio of 1.7. However, pH decreased by up to 3.7 pH units, and ORP increased by up to 208 mV. The antimicrobial efficacy of "aged" electrolyzed oxidizing (EO) water with different ACC and ORP, but the same pH (i.e., 3.4 ± 0.2), was evaluated against Escherichia coli and Listeria innocua to determine any differences in residual antimicrobial activity. EO water with an ACC of ≥7 mg/L and an ORP of 1,094 mV caused a reduction of at least 4.7 log, whereas EO water with nondetectable ACC and considerably high ORP (716 mV) had little antimicrobial effect (<1-log reduction). Results from this study indicate that the efficacy of NEW as a sanitizer for large-scale applications such as horticulture can be maintained for at least 3 months when it is stored in closed containers with low SA:V ratio at low temperatures.

HIGHLIGHTS


The development of the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory, an instrument for assessing positive outcomes reported by persons who have experienced traumatic events, is described. This 21-item scale includes factors of New Possibilities, Relating to Others, Personal Strength, Spiritual Change, and Appreciation of Life. Women tend to report more benefits than do men, and persons who have experienced traumatic events report more positive change than do persons who have not experienced extraordinary events. The Posttraumatic Growth Inventory is modestly related to optimism and extraversion. The scale appears to have utility in determining how successful individuals, coping with the aftermath of trauma, are in reconstructing or strengthening their perceptions of self, others, and the meaning of events.


This paper re-examines the question of perspective as a representational strategy in the context of landscape architectural design and description. The alignment of perspective with a limited understanding of its representational potential, primarily as pictorial/compositional operations of picturesque space-making, has compromised its agency in the exploration of landscape spatiality. In this context, the term land-scopic regimes derives directly from Martin Jay's (1988) identification of the "scopic regimes of modernity" ("descriptive," "baroque," and "Cartesian perspectivalism") and is proposed here as supplemental to, and co-existent with, the more familiar operation of Cartesian representational modes. Thus land-scopic regimes refer to those revised visual discourses that engage habits of perceiving the landscape specifically as primary representational modes, for example, those familiar categories of the dioramic or (photo)montagic, and the new category of the phenomenological picturesque within a picturesque scopic regime. This paper also posits that perspective and landscape both perpetually engage the condition of the in-between. The representational structure of perspective itself may be understood to operate both across an interval—that is, between the space of the viewer and its contingent worldly relations—and as an examination of intervals per se, the projection of future and contingent relations. Alternative interpretations of perspective structure as perspectival representation proposed here emphasize its open-ended, mutable, relational properties that engage the space of the in-between, a condition in which and through which landscape processes and spatiality operate. Deleuze and Guattari's (1987) contemporary ontology of dynamic relations exemplified by the "Body without Organs" and the "rhizome" promotes reconsideration of the in-between as a potentiality, as the place wherein futurity and becoming unfold.


The effects in vivo of dichloromethanediphosphonate and 1-hydroxyethane 1,1-diphosphonate on collagen solubility, hydroxylation of lysine and proline and on the formation of collagen intermolecular cross-links were studied by using rat bone, cartilage and skin tissues. Dichloromethanediphosphonate decreased bone collagen solubility both in acetic acid and after pepsin treatment. Although none of the diphosphonates had any effect on the hydroxylation of proline, dichloromethane-diphosphonate, but not 1-hydroxyethane-1,1-diphosphonate, increased the number of hydroxylysine residues in the alpha-chains of bone, skin and cartilage collagen. The stimulatory effect was dose-dependent. The dichloromethanediphosphonate-mediated increase in hydroxylysine residues in bone and cartilage was manifested in an increase of dihydroxylysinonorleucine, the cross-link that is formed by the condensation of two hydroxylysine residues. The cross-link hydroxylysinonorleucine, a condensation product of hydroxylysine and lysine, on the other hand, was decreased. The total number of intermolecular cross-links was not changed by the diphosphonate.


As fallout from the global financial crisis intensified in October 2008, governments around the world sought to implement stabilization measures in order to calm and protect their domestic markets. While not directly exposed to the subprime mortgage crisis, the Kingdom of the Netherlands announced the creation of the Dutch Credit Guarantee Scheme (the Guarantee Scheme) on October 13, 2008, to boost confidence in interbank lending markets and to ensure the flow of credit to Dutch households and companies. In establishing this program, the Dutch State Treasury Agency of the Ministry of Finance (DSTA) committed €200 billion to support the issuance of debt to be guaranteed by the government. Dutch financial institutions meeting liquidity and solvency requirements enforced by De Nederlandsche Bank, including foreign subsidiaries established in the Netherlands with substantial business in the country, were eligible to apply for coverage under the Guarantee Scheme. Initially, only newly issued "plain vanilla" commercial paper, certificates of deposit, and fixed- or floating-rate medium-term notes with maturities of between three months and three years could be guaranteed. Additionally, debt instruments would need to be denominated in euros, US dollars, or pounds sterling. Between October 23, 2008, and December 1, 2009, the Guarantee Scheme was utilized by six Dutch financial institutions for a total utilization of €54.2 billion. No guaranteed debt was issued after December 1, 2009. The issuance window, though originally set to expire December 31, 2009, was extended twice, to December 31, 2010. No institutions defaulted on any guaranteed debt.


Two kinds of β-SiAlON nanostructure whiskers, rod-like and wool-like whiskers, were synthesized by pressure-less sintering method at 1773 K for 5 hours. The whiskers synthesized were characterized by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), transmission electron microscope (TEM), and high-resolution electron microscope (HREM) techniques. It was found that diameter distribution of rod-like whiskers was about 80–250 nm, while it was about 45–55 nm in diameter for the wool-like whiskers. The growth mechanisms of β-SiAlON nanostructure whiskers are discussed by the vapor-solid (VS) and vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanisms, respectively.


The embryonic cuticle is necessary for normal seed development and seedling establishment in Arabidopsis. Although mutants with defective embryonic cuticles have been identified, neither the deposition of cuticle material, nor its regulation, has been described during embryogenesis. Here we use electron microscopy, lipid staining and permeability assays to show that cuticle deposition initiates de novo in patches on globular embryos. By combining these techniques with genetics and gene expression analysis, we show that successful patch coalescence to form a continuous cuticle requires a signalling involving the endosperm-specific subtilisin protease ALE1 and the receptor kinases GSO1 and GSO2, which are expressed in the developing embryonic epidermis. Transcriptome analysis shows that this pathway regulates stress-related gene expression in seeds. Consistent with these findings we show genetically, and through activity analysis, that the stress-associated MPK6 protein acts downstream of GSO1 and GSO2 in the developing embryo. We propose that a stress-related signalling pathway has been hijacked in some angiosperm seeds through the recruitment of endosperm-specific components. Our work reveals the presence of an inter-compartmental dialogue between the endosperm and embryo that ensures the formation of an intact and functional cuticle around the developing embryo through an "auto-immune" type interaction.


Inhibitors of melanin biosynthesis were screened by using three different methods. The extract of Veratrum patulum contains hydroxystilbene compounds that are potent tyrosinase inhibitors. We evaluated the enzyme inhibitory property on the mushroom tyrosinase of hydroxystilbene compounds including resveratrol, oxyresveratrol, and their analogs. Biotransformation using cellulase of the whole extract brought about an increase in the inhibitory activity of the products on mushroom tyrosinase. The enhancement of tyrosinase inhibition is supposed to increase the concentration of aglycon, which has superior inhibitory activity to its glycoside. Eventually, melanin biosynthesis was inhibited by the enhanced tyrosinase inhibitory activity of the extract. This result indicated that deglycosylation of stilbene compounds has exerted more effective inhibition on the enzyme than that of the unprocessed plant extract. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


Welcome to the International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE). This year ICSE takes place in Buenos Aires, Argentina. For the first time in its 42 years of history, ICSE visits Latin America. From the rich set of events and activities that we have scheduled for this week, there is no doubt that ICSE 2017 will be as lively and as interesting as its host city.


The progressive ratio (PR) schedule of reinforcement is widely used to assess reinforcement strength. Rats typically complete higher ratio requirements for more palatable food. This effect is well characterized by the Mathematical Principles of Reinforcement (MPR). In this experiment, either standard food pellets or amaranth grain were delivered according to PR schedules, with requirements increasing in steps of 1 (PR 1) or 3 (PR 3). Rats completed higher ratio requirements and displayed shorter pre-ratio pauses for pellets than for amaranth. Nevertheless, run-rates were similar across reinforcers. In terms of the theoretical parameters of MPR, similar values in a parameter (which indices incentive value) were obtained for amaranth and pellet reinforcers. This finding suggests that, although amaranth engenders less responding than pellets, amaranth grain is a reliable reinforcer for operant procedures. The MPR model accounted for the differences in quality of food.


97 TUESDAY AFTERNOON, JANUARY 6, 1998 CONCOURSE, 2:OO TO 5:OO Session 6T CRYSTALLINE SOFT MAGNETIC MATERIALS (POSTER SESSION) r R. F. Krause, Chair Magnetics International, 11 11 N. State Road 149, Burns Harbor, IN 46304 r+ c Contributed Papers perature than (Fe,Co) alloys. (Effort sponsored by the Air Force Office of BT-01. MAGNETIC PROPERTIES AND ORDERING IN C-COATED Fe,Co,-, ALLOY NANOCRYSTALS. 2. Turgut, I. H. Scott, M. Q. Huang, S. A. Majetich, and M. E. McHenry (Dept. of Mater. Sci. and Eng., Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA 15213) C-coated Fe,Co,-, (x=0.50, 0.45, 0.40, 0.35, 0.30, 0.25, wt %) nanoparticles were produced using an RF plasma torch. The only C source was acetylene used as a carrier gas. Structural determination by x-ray diffraction indicated a single disordered BCC a-FeCo phase along with graphitic C for all compositions. After annealing, x-ray diffraction indicated some carbide formation. A Scherrer analysis of the peak widths revealed particles to have an average diameter of 50 nm. A broad log-normal size distribution was found from E M observations. EDX indicated compositional fluctuations of a few atomic Q for individual particles of one nominal composition which is attributed to starting with elemental rather than alloy precursors. Magnetic hysteresis loops have been measured to temperatures exceeding 1050 K and revealed relatively high room temperature coercivities (200-400 Oe), with a strong compositional variation similar to that observed in bulk alloys. Larger coercivities are consistent with particles near the monodomain size for these alloys. The temperature dependence of the magnetization revealed the effects of atomic ordering. The variation of the saturation magnetization as a function of temperature showed a discontinuity near the bulk order-disorder (a-+ a') transformation temperature, as well as loss of magnetization at the a-y structural phase transition temperature. Other features of M(T) near 500-550 C are consistent with prior observations of a "550 C structural anomaly" which has been observed in bulk alloys with less than perfect order. (Effort sponsored by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Air Force Materiel Command, USAF, under Grant No. F49620-96-1-0454. The U.S. Govemment is authorized to reproduce and distribute reprints for Governmental purposes notwithstanding any copyright notation thereon.) BT-02. SOFT MAGNETIC PROPERTIES OF LaCo13 AND La(Co,Fe),3 ALLOYS. M. Q. Huang, W. E. Wallace, M. E. McHenry (Dept. of Mater. Sci. and Eng., Camegit Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA 15213). Q. Chen. and B. M. Ma (Rhone-Poulenc, Rare Earths and Gallium, CN 7500, Cranberry, NI 08512) LaCo,, is an attractive material for applications at high temperature because of its high T, (1297 K) and large magnetic induction (1.3 T). In the work described here, magnetic properties of LaCo,, have been studied from 10 K to 1273 K in fields from 0 to 5 T. Measurements show that coercivity, H,, for a bulk sample is 6 to 9 Oe at room temperature and decreases almost linearly with increasing temperature. H, at 800 C is about 30% reduced from that at room temperature. The magnetocrystalline anisotropy constant K, is estimated using the law of approach to saturation to be 3.5-6X IO5 erg/cm3. The absolute magnetization can be increased by replacement of CO with 50% Fe replacement has been achieved. This results in a substantial rise in magnetization, from 1.3 T for Lac013 10 1.6 of LaCo,, alloy. 6-9 Oe at room temperature. Studies are underway of AC magnetic properties in the La(Co,Fe),, temaries. La(Co,Fe),3 alloys may compete with (Fe,Co) alloys as a high temperature soft magnetic material, since the latter have an order-disorder transition at about 750 C and a phase transition to the nonmagnetic y phase at about 970 C. LaCo,3 is free of this complexity, thus enabling it to potentially function at higher temT for J + a ( C ~ & ~ 4 ) 1 3 , The He of the La(Co,Fe)l3 alloys SlmllN aS that Scientific Research, Air Force Materiel Command, USAF under Grant No. F49620-96-1-0454. The U.S. Government is authorized to reproduce and distribute reprints for Governmental purposes notwithstanding any copyright notation thereon.) BT-03. MAGNETIC PROPERTLES OF AN FeCo ALLOY SINGLE CRYSTAL. S.-Y. Chu. M.-Q. Huang, C. Kline, and M. E. McHenry (Dept. of Mater. Sci. and Eng., Carnegie MeIIon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA 15213) Temperature and field orientation dependence of magnetization of ferromagnetic materials are important in both understanding fundamental magnetic and industrially relevant technical properties. For the FeCo alloy system such an investigation has been limited only in using polycrystalline samples. In this work, we present results of single crystal growth of an equiatomic FeCo alloy. The composition and microstructure were characterized by the EDX, SEM, X-ray diffraction and h u e diffraction. The temperature and field dependence of the magnetic moment with the magnetic field oriented in the [loo], [110], and [ill] crystallographic directions were measured using a DC (SQUID magnetometer) and vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM) technique in temperature region from 5 K to 1270 K. The anisotropy of magnetic properties of FeCo alloy is discussed and an optimum texture for improving properties in large polycrystalline samples. (Effort sponsored by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Air Force Materiel Command, USAF, under Grant No. F49620-96-10454. The U.S. Government is authorized to reproduce and distribute reprints for Governmental purposes notwithstanding any copyright notation


Background/Objectives: For successful exporting poultry meat to the China's market it is necessary to understand Chinese consumers' preferences, expectations and values. The article is aimed at studying consumer preferences in the China's poultry market. Methods: Consumer preferences were studied by the survey method. In addition, expert survey was carried out, the purpose of which was to identify and analyze the factors influencing the formation of consumer preferences. Findings: The study was conducted in 2015 in Harbin, China. The research resulted in the portrait of the consumer of poultry meat in China. These are persons with average and above average income, regardless of age and gender who use poultry meat several times a week and take care of their health. Price, quality of the poultry meat, the manufacturer's reputation and recommendations from friends are factors exerting strong influence on the formation of consumer preferences. The Russian market operators should also carry out promotional activities; take into account the requirements of the competition. In addition to technical re-equipment, to ensure product competitiveness in the global market compliance of domestic products with international requirements should be provided. Applications/Improvements: The research results are of great interest for companies that are planning to export activities in the market of China's poultry meat.


In order to improve software maintenance processes, we first need to be able to characterize and assess them. These tasks must be performed in depth and with objectivity since the problems are complex. One approach is to set up a measurement-based software process improvement program specifically aimed at maintenance. However, establishing a measurement program requires that one understands the problems to be addressed by the measurement program and is able to characterize the maintenance environment and processes in order to collect suitable and cost-effective data. Also, enacting such a program and getting usable data sets takes time. A short term substitute is therefore needed. We propose in this paper a characterization process aimed specifically at maintenance and based on a general qualitative analysis methodology. This process is rigorously defined in order to be repeatable and usable by people who are not acquainted with such analysis procedures. A basic feature of our approach is that actual implemented software changes are analyzed in order to understand the flaws in the maintenance process. Guidelines are provided and a case study is shown that demonstrates the usefulness of the approach.


This investigation was carried out by the National Advisory Committee at Langley Field for the purpose of determining the adaptability of the camera obscura to the securing of turning characteristics of airships, and also of obtaining some of those characteristics of the C-7 airship. The method consisted in flying the airship in circling flight over a camera obscura and photographing it at known time intervals. The results show that the method used is highly satisfactory and that for the particular maneuver employed the turning diameter is 1,240 feet, corresponding to a turning coefficient of 6.4, and that the position of zero angle of yaw is at the nose of the airship.


Continued reduction in the size of a transistor has affected the reliability of processors built using them. This is primarily due to factors such as inaccuracies while manufacturing, as well as non-ideal operating conditions, causing transistors to slow down consistently, eventually leading to permanent breakdown and erroneous operation of the processor. Permanent transistor breakdown, or faults, can occur at any point in time in the processor's lifetime. Errors are the discrepancies in the output of faulty circuits. This dissertation shows that the components containing faults can continue operating if the errors caused by them are within certain bounds. Further, the lifetime of a processor can be increased by adding supportive structures that start working once the processor develops these hard errors. This dissertation has three major contributions, namely REPAIR, FaultSim and PreFix. REPAIR is a fault tolerant system with minimal changes to the processor design. It uses an external Instruction Re-execution Unit (IRU) to perform operations, which the faulty processor might have erroneously executed. Instructions that are found to use faulty hardware are then re-executed on the IRU. REPAIR shows that the performance overhead of such targeted re-execution is low for a limited number of faults. FaultSim is a fast fault-simulator capable of simulating large circuits at the transistor level. It is developed in this dissertation to understand the effect of faults on different circuits. It performs digital logic based simulations, trading off analogue accuracy with speed, while still being able to support most fault models. A 32-bit addition takes under 15 micro-seconds, while simulating more than 1500 transistors. It can also be integrated into an architectural simulator, which added a performance overhead of 10 to 26 percent to a simulation. The results obtained show that single faults cause an error in an adder in less than 10 percent of the inputs. PreFix brings together the fault models created using FaultSim and the design directions found using REPAIR. PreFix performs re-execution of instructions on a remote core, which pick up instructions to execute using a global instruction buffer. Error prediction and detection are used to reduce the number of re-executed instructions. PreFix has an area overhead of 3.5 percent in the setup used, and the performance overhead is within 5 percent of a fault-free case. This dissertation shows that faults in processors can be tolerated without explicitly switching off any component, and minimal redundancy is sufficient to achieve the same.


The aim of this study was to ascertain the accessibility of public libraries by rural dwellers in Delta State. The descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. Five Hundred and Forty (540) respondents were selected from the population of 1,337,010 using quota and accidental sampling techniques while the questionnaire was the instrument used for data collection. Two research questions were raised and simple percentages and frequency counts were used for data analysis. Five hundred and forty (540) copies of the questionnaire were distributed to the respondents and (352) three hundred and fifty two i.e. (65%) copies were returned. The study found out that, the public libraries are not accessible to rural dwellers as a result, the users rarely make use of the libraries. However, more male mak e use of the library than female while the age of 41-45 rarely make use of the library as compared to 20-25 years of age. In conclusion, public libraries are essential to rural dwellers; therefore it is recommended that all types of information be made available to public libraries. Sensitization programmes should be encouraged. This will in turn bring about positive impact on the rural dwellers. Key words : Accessibility, Public, Library, rural, Dwellers.


In histochemical (with the glyoxylic acid) and biochemical (spectrofluorimetric trioxyindolic method) investigations sources and content of catecholamines (dopa, noradrenalin, adrenalin) in the blood vessels, sympathetic chains, adrenals and cardiac ventricles have been studied in autumn-winter and spring-summer frogs at various temperatures. It was found that the catecholamines in the studied tissues are located in the sympathetic neurons, adrenergic terminals and chromaffin cells. The ratio of these structures in different tissues was various. It was found that the catecholamine level in frog blood vessels and various organs undergoes seasonal and temperature variations. The increase of temperature from + 5 to 20 degrees caused a decrease in the catecholamine level in the autumn-winter frogs, but increased the catecholamine concentrations over 60--100% in the spring-summer ones.


ABSTRACTIn a variety of medical and industrial uses, small amounts of perfluorodecalin (C10F18) may have been released into the environment. However, it may significantly contribute to the global warming due to its highly radiative efficiency and global warming potential (GWP). Using the chemical similarity approach, this article aimed at calculating the fate properties and discussing the environmental implications of the perfluorinated compound for the purpose of mitigating its emissions. The environmental fate properties of perfluorodecalin, including octanol-water partition coefficient, water solubility and Henry's law constant, were first estimated in the present study. These predicted values were further compared with those of other chemically similar compounds such as naphthalene, decalin and decane. From the computational findings, perfluorodecalin, which has exceptionally low solubility in water and high vaporization from the water bodies, tends to be hydrophobic and partitioned into organic matter, suggesting that it will sink into the atmosphere. Also addressed in the paper was a possible proposal for forming trifluoroacetic acid in the atmosphere by the ionized photolysis of perfluorodecalin.


Over the last few years, the network community has started to rely heavily on the use of novel concepts such as fractals, self-similarity, long-range dependence, power-laws. Especially evidence of fractals, self-similarity and long-range dependence in network traffic have been widely observed. Despite their wide use, there is still much confusion regarding the identification of such phenomena in real network traffic data. For one, the Hurst exponent can not be calculated in a definitive way, it can only be estimated. Second, there are several different methods to estimate the Hurst exponent, but they often produce conflicting estimates. It is not clear which of the estimators provides the most accurate estimation. In this extended abstract, we make a first step towards a systematic approach in estimating self-similarity and long-range dependence. We present SELFIS, a javabased tool that will automate the self-similarity analysis. To our knowledge, our software tool is the first attempt to create a stand-alone, free, open-source platform to facilitate self-similarity analysis. We show the use of our tool and describe the methodologies that currently incorporates in real Internet data. Finally, we present an intuitive approach to validate the existence of long-range dependence.


With more than one million people behind bars, the United States imprisons a larger share of its population than any other industrialized nation. This has precipitated a serious overcrowding problem with federal and state prisons currently operating well beyond capacity. Conventional efforts appear unable to cope with the increasing shortage of beds or with inadequate rehabilitation services. A bold solution is required; increasingly it is being seen to reside in the private sector. This timely volume explores the issues of private versus public financing, construction, and management of medium-and high-security prisons. Private prisons are not a new concept in the United States. They have existed in several forms since the eighteenth century. The opening chapters evaluate historical cases of prisons for profit, examining the concerns of labor, abuses of inmates, and the source and resolution of disputes between private and public sectors. These chapters argue that the experience gained through privatization does not justify current opposition from civil libertarians or labor unions. Chapters dealing with the modern contracting out of complete management and limited services document the growing trend toward privatization and instances of public/private partnership in prison industries. The assembled evidence indicates clearly that privately run prisons have shown significant cost savings and good quality of provision for prisoners while still being profitable. However, the authors caution that these promising results must be reinforced by public safeguards in the contracting stage and monitoring to assure good service and security. With the American prison system in disarray, the public interest demands that government look beyond the public or private identity of those who wish to provide correctional services and focus instead on who can provide the best services at a given cost. It is essential to state that correctional services should attain several objectives and not merely cost minimization. The analysis and recommendations presented here will aid in the task. "Privatizing Correctional Institutions "will be of interest to law-enforcement officials, public policy analysts, penologists, and criminologists.


As a pioneering work, PointContrast conducts unsupervised 3D representation learning via leveraging contrastive learning over raw RGB-D frames and proves its effectiveness on various downstream tasks. However, the trend of large-scale unsupervised learning in 3D has yet to emerge due to two stumbling blocks: the inefficiency of matching RGB-D frames as contrastive views and the annoying mode collapse phenomenon mentioned in previous works. Turning the two stumbling blocks into empirical stepping stones, we first propose an efficient and effective contrastive learning framework, which generates contrastive views directly on scene-level point clouds by a well-curated data augmentation pipeline and a practical view mixing strategy. Second, we introduce reconstructive learning on the contrastive learning framework with an exquisite design of contrastive cross masks, which targets the reconstruction of point color and surfel normal. Our Masked Scene Contrast (MSC) framework is capable of extracting comprehensive 3D representations more efficiently and effectively. It accelerates the pretraining procedure by at least 3 x and still achieves an uncompromised performance compared with previous work. Besides, MSC also enables large-scale 3D pre-training across multiple datasets, which further boosts the performance and achieves state-of-the-art fine-tuning results on several downstream tasks, e.g., 75.5% mIoU on ScanNet semantic segmentation validation set.


We present RelSifter, a supervised learning approach to the problem of assigning relevance scores to triples expressing type-like relations such as 'profession' and 'nationality.' To provide additional contextual information about individuals and relations we supplement the data provided as part of the WSDM 2017 Triple Score contest with Wikidata and DBpedia, two large-scale knowledge graphs (KG). Our hypothesis is that any type relation, i.e., a specific profession like 'actor' or 'scientist,' can be described by the set of typical "activities" of people known to have that type relation. For example, actors are known to star in movies, and scientists are known for their academic affiliations. In a KG, this information is to be found on a properly defined subset of the second-degree neighbors of the type relation. This form of local information can be used as part of a learning algorithm to predict relevance scores for new, unseen triples. When scoring 'profession' and 'nationality' triples our experiments based on this approach result in an accuracy equal to 73% and 78%, respectively. These performance metrics are roughly equivalent or only slightly below the state of the art prior to the present contest. This suggests that our approach can be effective for evaluating facts, despite the skewness in the number of facts per individual mined from KGs.


Agriculture in Developing countries and the Role of Government: From an Economic Perspective Agriculture has been a critical driver of well-being for centuries, ensuring food security and catalyzing productivity needed for economic prosperity (Robin, 2011). According to the International Food Policy Research Institute, sixty-five percent of African relies on agriculture as a primary source of livelihood, where small-scale famers are responsible for ninety percent of agricultural production (IFPRI, 2009). Across the African continent, there has been a renewed commitment from governments, non-governmental organizations and the private sector to move agriculture from a development challenge to a business opportunity. As a result, countries such as Nigeria are moving to once again become a net exporter rather than importer of agricultural commodities (Robin, 2011). However, despite these developments, many smallholder farmers, who form the backbone of Africa's agriculture sector, remain trapped in poverty (Robin, 2011). Indeed, African spending on agriculture represented 6 to 7 per cent of the total national budget for 1980-05, while in Asia the corresponding number was 6-15 per cent (IFPRI, 2009). The objective of this research is to determine the manner in which government assistance to African farmers varies taking into account factors such as rural population share, real GDP per capita, arable land share etc. The data for this research will be based on a new World Bank dataset of indicators of distortions to domestic price of agriculture and non-agriculture commodities drawn from a sample of 40 countries of which 20 are from Sub-Saharan Africa, 12 from Asian developing and 8 from Latin American developing countries. Those indicators compiled by Anderson and Valenzuela (2008) contain the nominal rates of assistance to agricultural tradables relative to non-agricultural tradables and the nominal rates of assistance to agricultural importables and agricultural exportables (Bates and Block, 2009). In addition, another indicator "cash-food bias index" shows how producers of cash crops are treated relative to producers of food crops will also be incorporated. We will examine how factors such as rural population share, real GDP per capita, arable land share, natural resource endowment, and geographical location affect the assistance farmers receive from government. We are hypothesizing that rural population share will have a negative impact on the level of assistance farmers receive. Indeed, Bates and Block (2009) argue that government policies toward agriculture will tend to be detrimental to farmers the greater "the rural dwellers share of population" depending upon the nature of the party system. When taking into account geographical location, we argue that farmers living in coastal countries will experience less support from government compared to those living in landlocked countries. In fact, Ndulu et al. (2007) conclude that landlocked countries are more likely to show least bias against agriculture trade than coastal states which tend to display the greatest bias. The evidence of natural resource endowment on government agricultural policies has been mixed. Bourguignon and Verdier (2000) suggest that governments of resource rich countries will tend to exhibit less support for agriculture since the existence of natural resources may prevent redistribution of political power towards the middle classes and thus prevent adoption of growth-promoting policies; and Isham et al (2003) to add that resource wealth worsens quality of institution because it allows governments to avoid accountability and resist modernization. However, Bates and Block (2009) contend that governments of resource rich countries have a tendency to enact policies that favor producers of both food and cash crops. They argue that Governments of resource rich countries specifically in Africa have tended to protect food crops, raising the level of domestic prices above those prevailing in world markets, while taxing cash crops (Bates and Block, 2009). When using arable land share as a proxy for the overall importance of agriculture, Bates and Block (2009) find that it is positively related to policy orientation of governments towards agriculture. This study takes a new approach by providing a cross-regional analysis of government level of assistance to farmers in Asian and Latin American developing countries, which will enable us to compare government support for agriculture in the three regions while focusing primarily on Africa. For this purpose three regressions will be used for each region. In the first regression government level of assistance to farmers will be measured by the relative rate of assistance which captures the relative support given to agriculture versus non-agricultural tradables, and it is found as follows: (Anderson et al. 2008, Bates and Block 2009) RRA=(1+〖NRA〗_(〖ag〗^t ))/(1+〖NRA〗_(〖nonag〗^t ) )-1, where 〖NRA〗_(〖ag〗^t ) is the nominal rate of assistance to agricultural tradables, and 〖NRA〗_(〖nonag〗^t ) is the nominal rate of assistance to non-agricultural tradables. The second regression will have the trade bias index as a measure of government level of assistance to farmers, it determines the relative assistance of government to exportables versus importable. It is found as follows: (Anderson et al. 2008, Bates and Block 2009) TBI=(1+〖NRAag〗_x)/(1+〖NRAag〗_m )-1, where 〖NRAag〗_x is the nominal rate of assistance to agricultural exportables and 〖NRAag〗_m is the nominal rate of assistance to agricultural importable. The third regression seeks to determine whether producers of cash crops compared to producers of food crops benefit the most from government policies. We use the "cash-food bias index as a measure of government level of assistance to farmers. It can be found as follows: (Anderson et al. 2008, Bates and Block 2009) CFBI=(1+NRAcashcrops)/(1+NRAfoodcrops)-1, where NRAcashcrops refers to the nominal rate of assistance to cash crops and NRAfoodcrops is the nominal rate of assistance to food crops. Our generic model is: y_it=α+δ_1 Resource rich+δ_2 Landlocked +δ_3 Rural population share+δ_4 (Resource rich*Rural population share)_it+X_it β+U_i+e_it , where y_it is our dependent variable depicting government level of assistance to farmers for country i in year t through the policy indicators defined above, Resource rich is a dummy variable for resource rich-countries, Landlocked is a dummy variable for landlocked contries, Rural population share is the share of a country's population living in rural areas, X stands for the control variables such as real GDP per capita, arable land share in country i in year t, V_i the random disturbance that captures unobserved time invariant country-specific effects, and e_it is the error term associated with country i in year t.The parameters of our models will be estimated using the fixed effects and random effects models following Greene (2010). The fixed effect is specified as: y_it=X_it^' β+α_i+e_it , where α_i=Z_i^' α, embodies all the observable effects and specifies an estimable conditional mean. It implies that Z_i is unobserved, but correlated withX_it. The random effects model is specified as: y_it=X_it^' β+α+U_i+e_it , where U_i is a group-specific random element, similar to e_it except that for each group, there is but a single draw that enters the regression identically in each period. Then, following Hausman (1978) we will perform the Hausman's specification test. Using these outcomes as the background of their decision making process policy makers in developing countries particularly in Africa may advocate for a transformation of the agriculture sector with an emphasis on improving farmers' wellbeing. If for instance, it is provided that farmers are worse off in regions with a high rate of rural population share, policy makers may consider taking actions that encourage farm modernization or the use of productive inputs in agriculture. References Anderson, K., and E. Valenzuela (2008), Estimates of Distortions to Agricultural Incentives, 1955 to 2007, core database at www.worldbank.org/agdistortions. Anderson, K., M. Kurzweil, W. Martin, D. Sandri and E. Valenzuela (2008), "Measuring Distortions to Agricultural Incentives, Revisited", World Trade Review 7(4):1-30. Bates, R., S. Block (2010), "Political Institutions and Agricultural Trade Interventions in Africa", American Journal of Agricultural Economics 93, 317-323. Bourguignon, F., and T. Verdier (2000a), "Oligarchy, Democracy, Inequality, and Growth", Journal of Development Economics 62: 285-313. Diao, X., P. Hazell, D. Resnick, and J. Thurlow (2007), "The Role of Agriculture in Development: Implications for Sub-Saharan Africa", Research Report 153, Washington DC: IFPRI. Greene, W.H. (2012), Econometric Analysis, Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, seventh edition, 2012. Hausman, J.A. (1978), "Specification Tests in Econometrics", Econometrica 46(6):1251-1271. International Food Policy Research Institute (2009), Media briefing on GM Crops for African Farmers, May 19, 2019, Washington DC: IFPRI. Retrieved from http://www.ifpri.org/publication/agriculture-s-critical-role-africa-s-development Isham, J., L. Pritchett, M. Woolock, and G. Bushy (2003), "The Varieties of the Resource Experience: How Natural Resource Export Structures Affect the Political Economy of Economic Growth", World Bank, Washington DC. Ndulu, B., P. Collier, R. Bates and S. O'Connell (2007), The Political Economy of Economic Growth in Africa, 1960-2000, 2 volumes, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Robin, J. (2011), "Bringing Finance and Innovation to Advance a Green Revolution in Africa", This is Africa published by the Financial Times Limited, London, United Kingdom. World Bank (2007), World Development Indicators 2007, Washington DC: World Bank.


: Foot-and-mouth disease was a problem as early as 1862; however, insights into the aetiology and particularly the concept of infectious disease had not yet been elaborated. Our knowledge and the possibilities of dealing with the disease have shown a spectacular increase since then. Foot-and-mouth disease is now under control in large parts of Europe; this is the result of strict measures and mass vaccination of cattle. However, the situation is unstable, as is testified to by the situation in Italy, and there are questions regarding the origin of sporadic cases of the disease. The main question is: how do we reach the ultimate objective: a Western Europe free from foot-and-mouth disease, and where annual vaccination of cattle no longer is applied? The problems are analysed. An international approach appears to be essential.


From wind turbines it is known that the wake, induced by a turbine, has a negative impact on the energy production of downstream devices. Basically, the wake is a zone with reduced velocity behind a turbine. Further downstream, the velocity recovers gradually by turbulent mixing with the ambient flow. In order to optimize the design of a tidal farm, the aim of this paper is to find simple relations that can be used to predict the energy output of a given farm configuration. The energy output of a turbine depends on its inflow velocity. Therefore, the strategy is to find a model that is able to predict the velocity field in the tidal farm. Such 'wake models' exist already for wind turbines and thruster-thruster interaction. In this research, the applicability of these wake models to tidal turbines is investigated by comparing their results to reference data of tidal turbines. Only limited measurement data for tidal turbines are available; therefore a CFD model of a tidal turbine is used to generate the reference data. The velocity in the wake is simulated for different conditions with the CFD model. The CFD model is validated with the available data in the literature. The velocity in the wake for a single turbine is predicted accurately for different initial conditions. Modeling of the turbulence showed some discrepancies in the far wake, consequently the wake of turbines in farm configurations is predicted less accurate. Three wake models, selected from the literature, are compared to the CFD simulations of the wake behind a single turbine. The wind turbine wake model of Jensen performed best; the velocity in the wake is calculated accurate for different situations. Mutual interaction of wakes will occur inside tidal farms. Several methods from wind turbines theory are used to estimate the velocity in interaction situations. Three basic situations of wake interaction are distinguished: tandem operation, wake interference and overlapping inflow. The interaction methods are tested with CFD reference data for each situation separately. Most methods compared reasonably well; the most suitable interaction methods are selected. A small tidal farm case study is performed to test the combination of wake model and interaction methods. The flow in the cluster of 5 turbines is predicted satisfactorily by the wake model for different inflow velocities. All results indicate that the principle of applying wind turbine wake models to tidal turbine has good potential. However the number of test cases conducted in the thesis is limited and the incorrect turbulence modeling of the CFD model caused some uncertainties for multiple turbine situation.© 2010 ASME


Two components of conductor topography can impact conductor loss for signals in the GHz frequency range: conductor–ceramic interface roughness and conductor edge angle. This study is an experimental investigation of the influence of these conductor topographies on conductor loss in microstrip circuits produced by thick‐film technology. The aluminum nitride ceramic substrates have different surface roughnesses due to different surface finish processes. The substrate surfaces were characterized using conventional and length‐scale fractal analysis. The conductor–ceramic interface was measured with a contact profilometer. The conductor edge angle and conductor edge profile were measured optically. It was found that there is a direct correlation between conductor loss and conductor edge angle, whereas there is an inverse correlation between loss and substrate roughness or relative length of the conductor–ceramic interface. This is the opposite result to the conventional expectation of surface roughness effects on conductor loss. There is also a negative correlation between conductor edge angle and surface roughness or relative length. The loss behavior can be explained by the interaction of the conductor paste with the surfaces during processing. The paste tends to spread more on the smoother surfaces, and thus creates an elongated edge of diminishing cross‐section and a small edge angle. This leads to greater conductor loss. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Galaxy proto-clusters at z ≳ 2 ?> provide a direct probe of the rapid mass assembly and galaxy growth of present-day massive clusters. Because of the need for precise galaxy redshifts for density mapping and the prevalence of star formation before quenching, nearly all the proto-clusters known to date were confirmed by spectroscopy of galaxies with strong emission lines. Therefore, large emission-line galaxy surveys provide an efficient way to identify proto-clusters directly. Here we report the discovery of a large-scale structure at z = 2.44 in the Hobby Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment (HETDEX) Pilot Survey. On a scale of a few tens of Mpc comoving, this structure shows a complex overdensity of Lyα emitters (LAE), which coincides with broadband selected galaxies in the COSMOS/UltraVISTA photometric and zCOSMOS spectroscopic catalogs, as well as overdensities of intergalactic gas revealed in the Lyα absorption maps of Lee et al. We construct mock LAE catalogs to predict the cosmic evolution of this structure. We find that such an overdensity should have already broken away from the Hubble flow, and part of the structure will collapse to form a galaxy cluster with 10 14.5 ± 0.4 ?> M ⊙ ?> by z = 0. The structure contains a higher median stellar mass of broadband selected galaxies, a boost of extended Lyα nebulae, and a marginal excess of active galactic nuclei relative to the field, supporting a scenario of accelerated galaxy evolution in cluster progenitors. Based on the correlation between galaxy overdensity and the z = 0 descendant halo mass calibrated in the simulation, we predict that several hundred 1.9 < z < 3.5 ?> proto-clusters with z = 0 mass of > 10 14.5 M ⊙ ?> will be discovered in the 8.5 Gpc3 of space surveyed by the HETDEX.


The possibility of identifying people by the shape of their outer ear was first discovered by the French criminologist Bertillon, and refined by the American police officer Iannarelli, who proposed a first ear recognition system based on only seven features. The detailed structure of the ear is not only unique, but also permanent, as the appearance of the ear does not change over the course of a human life. Additionally, the acquisition of ear images does not necessarily require a person's cooperation but is nevertheless considered to be non-intrusive by most people. Owing to these qualities, the interest in ear recognition systems has grown significantly in recent years. In this survey, the authors categorise and summarise approaches to ear detection and recognition in 2D and 3D images. Then, they provide an outlook over possible future research in the field of ear recognition, in the context of smart surveillance and forensic image analysis, which they consider to be the most important application of ear recognition characteristic in the near future.


A space-time trellis code (STTC) using product distance codes (PDC) with delay diversity structure is studied and a super-optimal condition of product distance codes is proposed. The upper bound of the optimal product distance of codes on 8-PSK modulation is derived. The performance of STTC using various product distance codes found through a systematic code search is compared with that of delay diversity.


The purpose of the neurological examination is to determine the exact location of the lesions (neuroanatomic diagnosis) and to detect the neurological specific signs to SNC or SNP. In this article, the stages of the neurological examination, by distinguishing the specific signs of a particular area of SNS or SNP, are presented in order to establish a diagnosis and to perform a differential diagnosis algorithm based on the VITAMIND acronym. These steps lead to the establishment of a therapeutic protocol appropriate to the ongoing non-medical condition of the examined patient.


The cross section for the reaction $ e p \to e^{\prime} p \pi^{+} \pi^{-}$ was measured in the resonance region for 1.4$<$W$<$2.1 GeV and 0.5$<Q^{2}<$1.5 GeV$^{2}$/c$^{2}$ using the CLAS detector at Jefferson Laboratory. The data show resonant structures not visible in previous experiments. The comparison of our data to a phenomenological prediction using available information on $N^{*}$ and $\Delta$ states shows an evident discrepancy. A better description of the data is obtained either by a sizeable change of the properties of the $P_{13}$(1720) resonance or by introducing a new baryon state, not reported in published analyses.


We present a novel approach for the dimensionality reduction of galaxy images by leveraging a combination of variational auto-encoders (VAE) and domain adaptation (DA). We demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach using a sample of low redshift galaxies with detailed morphological type labels from the Galaxy-Zoo DECaLS project. We show that 40-dimensional latent variables can effectively reproduce most morphological features in galaxy images. To further validate the effectiveness of our approach, we utilised a classical random forest (RF) classifier on the 40-dimensional latent variables to make detailed morphology feature classifications. This approach performs similarly to a direct neural network application on galaxy images. We further enhance our model by tuning the VAE network via DA using galaxies in the overlapping footprint of DECaLS and BASS+MzLS, enabling the unbiased application of our model to galaxy images in both surveys. We observed that DA led to even better morphological feature extraction and classification performance. Overall, this combination of VAE and DA can be applied to achieve image dimensionality reduction, defect image identification, and morphology classification in large optical surveys.


This paper examines the pursuit of home within a diasporic British Indian Punjabi community. It is argued that the British Asian transnational pursuit of home is significantly shaped by the dynamic social context of South Asia as well as social processes within Britain and across the South Asian diaspora. Drawing upon a decade of original, transnational, ethnographic research within the UK and India, I analyse the rapidly changing social context of Punjab, India, and the impact of this upon the diasporic Punjabi pursuit of home. I particularly argue that increasing divisions between the UK diasporic group studied and the non-migrant permanent residents of Punjab, which are intrinsically related to processes of inclusion and exclusion within Punjab, especially the changing role and significance of land ownership and changing consumption practices therein, in turn connected to the increasing influence of economic neoliberalization and global consumer culture within India, significantly shapes the (re)production of home and identity amongst the Punjabi diaspora. Recent manifestations of these social processes within Punjab are threatening the very lived Indian home of some diasporic Punjabis, their Indian 'roots'.


Microarrays on gold have been used to develop new methodologies for biocatalysis and proteomic applications. The technology applies the logic of solid phase supported chemistry using self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) on a gold chip. The advantages of this technology are: i) an easy to handle platform, ii) parallel screening (64 reactions at once), iii) microliter scale reactions (1�L per sample), iv the use of mild conditions (buffers and t=37 �C), v) the absence of purification steps (only chip washing is required), vi) quick and accurate analysis by MALDI ToF MS.The metallopeptidase thermolysin was studied in peptide-coupling reactions to profile reactivity and specificity (Chapter 2). Reactivity was further investigated in transpeptidation reactions. Comparing the serine peptidase chymotrypsin with the zinc dependent thermolysin, it was found that transpeptidations proceed via N-transacylation reactions independent of a specific enzymatic catalytic mechanism (Chapter 3). These transacylations may be exploited for modifications of biocompatible and selective surfaces in ?bottom-up? bionanofabrication technologies. Selected peptidases with different catalytic mechanism were also arrayed to investigate polymerisation ability of dipeptides (Chapter 4). It was shown that oligomerisation can be obtained under mild conditions and a set of peptides was synthesised. Chapter 5 describes a new chemical methodology by which crude tryptic peptide digests can be trapped on chip and analysed by MALDI ToF MS without further purification steps. This dramatically improves time and cost efficiency.Finally, a new stepwise native chemical ligation methodology is proposed for amino acids, and peptides containing N-terminal cysteine residues (Chapter 6).


The present study focuses on the mechanical properties of hydrophilically or hydrophobically modified poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAAm) hydrogels, and all discussions on their improved mechanical strengths are based on the conformational effects of hydrophobic side chains attached to the comonomers and the structural differences between the crosslinkers. Three different types of monoalkyl itaconates, bearing octyl (Oc), cetyl (Ce), and cyclohexyl (CH) groups as comonomers, were used to prepare the copolymeric PNIPAAm hydrogels crosslinked with N,N′-methylenebisacrylamide (BIS) and tetraallylammonium bromide (TAB) as neutral tetrafunctional and ionic octafunctional crosslinkers, respectively. The most striking result is the compressive E modulus of TAB-crosslinked PNIPAAm hydrogel containing 10 mol % of mOcI. It reaches nearly 1.0 MPa and is independent of the temperature and pH of the swelling/shrinking medium. The result was discussed in terms of the inter/intramolecular interactions between hydrophobic octyl groups adopting a rod-like conformation in the case of 25 °C/distilled deionized water (DDW) and 37 °C/DDW combinations. Further, it was observed that the electrostatic repulsive forces between the carboxylate groups on mOcI units could be suppressed even at 37 °C and pH 9 due to the rod-like conformations of C8H17 groups. Its micrographs under bright-field and polarized light supported the presence of an ordered anisotropic phase and multiple associations of extended, hydrophobic side chains. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2017, 134, 45039.


Objectives: Fractional moving blood volume (FMBV) is the only method which can adjust for depth when power Doppler ultrasound (PDU) signals are obtained. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of tissue depth on perfusion indices obtained by 3D-PDU and FMBV. Methods: One hundred and eighty women with uncomplicated pregnancies between 24–28 weeks of gestation were examined. FMBV and vascular (VI), flow (FI) and vascular/flow (VFI) indices were studied. FMBV, VI and VFI were simultaneously evaluated in 3 structures located at different depths: cervix (n = 100, mean distance (MD) 23.1 mm, SD 5.1 mm), anterior placentas (n = 100, MD 32.2 mm, SD 5.7 mm) and posterior placentas (n = 80, MD 76.5 mm, SD 12 mm). Statistical analysis included an assessment of the correlation between the FMBV and 3D-PDU vascular indices. Results: The correlations between FMBV and VI and VFI were statistically significant in the cervix (VI: r = 0.83, VFI: r = 0.82; P < 0.001) and anterior placentas (VI: r = 0.72, VFI: r = 0.70; P < 0.001) but not in posterior placentas (VI: r = 0.29, VFI: r = 0.23; P = 0.07). There was no association between FMBV and FI in any structure. No differences in FMBV estimation were observed between anterior and posterior placentas (mean 22.8%, SD 8.5; mean 21.8%, SD 9.6, respectively; P = 0.2), whereas the VI and VFI were significantly reduced in posterior placentas (P < 0.02). Conclusions: 2D and 3D-PDU blood perfusion indices are strongly correlated when examining structures in close proximity to the ultrasound probe; however, when the structures are far from the ultrasound probe, 3D-PDU yields results that do not correlate with FMBV.


Acutely ill patients often demonstrate an altered level of consciousness. However, there are a variety of different reasons that may cause this alteration and nurses caring for patients without a defined cerebral event need to be aware of situations that can alter a patient's level of consciousness so that care strategies can be implemented. This article explains the concepts of consciousness and intracranial pressure and what is meant by an 'altered level of consciousness'. Assessment strategies are identified and a simple alternative to the Glasgow Coma Scale is identified that can be used as an initial assessment tool. This then allows the nurse caring for the patient with an altered level of consciousness to rationalize his/her intervention in relation to that patient.


Many international studies operate a distinction between intermodal or combined land and sea transport. The present paper aims at investigating whether, in the Italian context, this distinction characterizes the market both at the supply as well as at the demand level. Port regionalization has been encountered in many international situations such as the expansion phase of ports towards the hinterland with the creation of satellite structures closely connecting them. However, in many cases in Italy the birth of inland infrastructures for "independent" road-rail intermodality has been witnessed, albeit enjoying poor connections with ports. Investigation has been made into the capacity of Italian ports to compete in the Ro-Ro market through an evaluation model of the competitiveness of Italian ports specialized in Ro-Ro traffic, based on the principle components analysis (PCA) for determining a specific index. In order to assess the statistical significance of the variables considered for this index of competitiveness a linear regression has been carried out. A further opportunity for Italian terminals may be the possibility of carrying out intermodal sea-rail transport services directly within the port ambience and in particular "Ro-Ro-Rail" services or the transport of road-transported semi-trailers with Roll/on Roll/off ships directed at a later stage by rail from the ports for inland forwarding, and vice versa. In Italy this kind of opportunity has hardly ever been explored, if not completely ignored, whereas it might represent a significant market quota for north-south goods traffic, which is less and less frequently carried by rail and by intermodal road-rail transport.


Global failure: Cystocele with high mobility of cranial and caudal mesh aspects on Valsalva. Results: We saw 301 patients ≥ 3 months after AC + mesh. 5 were excluded because of missing data, leaving 296. Mean follow-up was 1.8 years (0.3–5.6). 139 had a Perigee, 66 an Anterior Prolift, 91 an Anterior Elevate. 242 (82%) were satisfied with the outcome, 275 (93%) considered themselves cured/improved. Recurrent prolapse symptoms were reported in 65 (22%). Recurrent cystocele was noted in 128 (43%) clinically and 105 (35%) on US. Mean Ba was −1.6 (−3 to +2). Mean cystocele descent was 5.1 mm below the pubis (+ 21.8 to −44 mm). Avulsion was diagnosed in 117 patients (39.5%). Mean hiatal area on Valsalva was 33.3 cm2. Mesh failure was diagnosed in 112 (38%); global in 81, apical in 23 and anterior in 8. Cystocele recurrence was associated with hiatal area (P < 0.001) and avulsion (P = 0.017). Apical and global mesh failure were also significantly associated with these parameters, but this was not the case for anterior failure. Conclusions: We documented mesh failure after AC + mesh in 38% at a mean of 1.8 years. Most were global or apical failures, implying dislodgment of lateral and/or apical anchors or fixation, and associated with hiatal area. It is plausible that a larger hiatus subjects anchoring structures to greater loads, increasing recurrence risk. Future studies should focus on improving implant design.


This report describes an ethnographic study of document use by anaesthetists. In doing so, it focuses on the role of the preoperative risk assessment form as used in anaesthetic practice at a cardiothoracic hospital, and considers what would be the advantages and disadvantages of shifting the paper into the electronic form. Evidence from this case study is used to comment on how the practical use of documents by medical professionals can be fundamentally at odds with how the organization at large would like to use them. We argue that hospital trusts need to take into account this practical perspective in order to build effective, on-line document systems.


The residual stresses could affect the ability of components to bear loading conditions and also the performance. The researchers considered workpiece surface as a plane and ignored the effect of surface topography induced by the intermittent cutting process when modeling residual stresses. The aim of this research develops an analytical model to predict workpiece residual stresses during intermittent machining by correlating the effect of surface topography. The relative motions of tool and workpiece are analyzed for modeling thermal-mechanical and surface topography. The influence of dynamic cutting force and thermal on different positions of surface topography is also considered in analytical model. Then the residual stresses model with the surface topography effect can be developed in intermittent cutting. The analytical models of dynamic cutting force, surface topography and residual stresses are verified by the experiments. The variation trend of evaluated values of the residual stress of workpiece is basically consistent with that of measured values. The compressive residual stress of workpiece surface in highest point of the surface topography are higher than that in the lowest point.


A series of interviews with academic and practicing designers was carried out to inform the development of a 'pleasure resource' that designers can use to enable understanding of the emotional needs of specific markets, at an early stage of the design process. In order to produce such a resource, it was necessary to investigate the attitudes and needs of designers on the subject of 'pleasure' in design. Findings show that designers are aware of the necessity to satisfy the emotional needs of the user, but there has to be a compromise with other factors e.g. production costs. Those interviewed tended to rely upon 'quick and dirty' research methods, with few aware of techniques and data that relate specifically to user pleasure. They expressed great interest in a 'pleasure resource' that gave them access to information about specific market groups' emotional needs. Several designers suggested a greater focus on user 'lifestyle' information to promote empathy with users. The information collected has led to the development of several concept resources for detailed evaluation by designers.